In Ingriland, fetishes like the Seven Mile Boots and the Cloak of Invisibility are real.In this kingdom, being the eldest of three siblings is really unlucky.Everyone knows that if three people go to the world together, the one who fails first and the one who is the most down-and-out will definitely be the boss. Sophie Hyatt was the eldest of three sisters.If she had been a poor woodcutter's daughter, she might have made it to the top.Her family is well off, and her parents run a millinery shop in Qiping Town.Sophie's biological mother died when Sophie was two, and her sister Letty was one.The father married the youngest clerk, a beautiful blonde named Fanny.Soon, Fanny gave birth to her younger sister Martha.It seems that Sophie and Letty will be doomed to the fate of their ugly sisters, but in fact the three girls are all beautiful, especially the voices of Letty's beauty are endless.Fanny treats the three girls equally and does not favor Martha.

Mr Haight was very fond of his three daughters and sent them to the best schools in town.Sophie is always the hardest worker.She wandered through the sea of ​​books, and soon realized how dull and bleak the future was.Although a little disappointed, Sophie is still happy, taking good care of her sister and Martha to seize her opportunities.Since Fanny was always busy in the store, Sophie naturally took care of the two younger sisters.From time to time, two little girls could be heard screaming, or fighting each other's hair.Letty would never want to be behind Sophie, a loser's back-up.

"It's not fair!" Letty would cry. "Why should Martha deserve the best because she's the youngest? I'll marry a prince, just wait and see!" Martha always said back that she could be super rich without marrying anyone. At this time Sophie would pull the two of them apart and help them mend their clothes.She is very good at her needlework.After a long time, I still make clothes for my sisters.On May Day, just before the story really kicked off, she helped Letty make a deep rose coat.Fanny said it looked as if it had been bought from the most expensive shop in Kingsbury.

At this time, the witch of the wasteland once again became the central topic of discussion in the streets and alleys.It is said that the witch threatened the life of the king's daughter, so the king sent his personal magician - Wizard Suliman - into the wasteland to negotiate with the witch.It seems that Wizard Suliman not only failed to negotiate with the witch, but also risked his own life. So a few months later, when a tall black castle suddenly appeared on the hill beside Qiping Town, and black smoke was blowing from four small towers, everyone believed that the witch had left the wasteland again, ready to use fifty The old tricks of years ago to terrorize this country.People are really getting scared.No one goes out alone, especially at night.What's even scarier is that the castle doesn't stay in the same place.Sometimes it is a dark shadow over the open fields to the northwest, sometimes it stands on the rocks to the east, and sometimes it sits downhill in the heather field, next to the northernmost farm.You see it actually move sometimes, the tower belches a dirty gray mist.For a while everyone thought that the castle would soon descend into the valley.The mayor starts talking about asking the king for help.

But the castle still walked around the mountain, and people heard that it belonged not to the witch, but to Wizard Howl.Wizard Howl is bad enough.He has made a name for himself collecting the hearts of young girls and sucking their souls for fun, and he doesn't seem to want to leave the mountains either.Others said he ate their hearts.He is a super cold-blooded, heartless wizard.Once caught by him, don't even think about escaping from his clutches.Sophie, Letty, and Martha, and all the other Chipping girls, were told not to go out alone.This is quite disturbing for them.They wondered what Wizard Howl was doing to collect those souls.

However, it didn't take long for them to stop thinking about it.Just when Sophie was old enough to graduate, Mr. Haight died suddenly.From this, it can be seen that Mr. Haight loved his daughter too much during his lifetime.Tuition fees put the hatters in heavy debt.After the funeral Fanny sat in the drawing-room of the house next door to the hatter's and talked about her situation. "I'm afraid you'll have to leave the school," she said. "I've been thinking about it for a long time, and I've found that the only way to do both business and you is to put you all in the right places as apprentices. Keep you all in the shop." It's not very practical here. So I've decided. The first one is Letty—"

Letty raised her head, and her whole body was shining with health and beauty, even the sad face and black mourning clothes could not hide it. "I want to keep going to school," she said. "You will, my dear," said Fanny. "I've arranged for you to be apprenticed to Cesare's, the baker in the market square. They say they treat apprentices like kings and queens, you You will be very happy there, and learn a useful trade. Lady Cesarey is a regular customer of the shop and a good friend, and she kindly promises to take you in." Letty laughed in a way that she didn't really like it at all. "Ah, thanks," she said, "thankfully I like cooking!"

Fanny breathed a sigh of relief.Letty can be incredibly stubborn at times. "Martha," she said, "I know you're too young to go out and work, so I've thought twice about getting you a long-term, secure apprenticeship that might be of some use to whatever you want to do. Do you remember My old classmate, Annabelle Fairfax?" The slender and beautiful Martha stared at Fanny, her big gray eyes were unblinking, and her eyes were as firm as Letty's. "You mean the chattering lady," she asked, "isn't she a witch?" "Yes, she has a fine house and customers all over Fording Valley," said Fanny eagerly. "She's a good person, Martha. She'll introduce you to a group of great people in Kingsbury. Learn from her." After that, the future will be smooth.”

"She's a good lady," Martha said reluctantly, "OK." Sophie had been listening, feeling that Fanny had made the best arrangements.As the second daughter, Letty was never likely to be particularly successful, so Fanny placed her where she might meet a handsome apprentice, so that she could live happily ever after.Martha is destined to venture into the world and win wealth, so she needs the help of witchcraft and noble people.As for Sophie herself, she was well aware of her impending fate.When Fanny spoke, she was not surprised, "Finally, dear Sophie, as the eldest daughter, you will be the sole heir to this hat shop after I retire. So I decided to take you in as an apprentice myself to get familiar with the business. What do you think?" how?"

Sophie actually felt helpless to inherit the family business, but she couldn't speak.She thanked Fanny. "That's all settled!" said Fanny. Sophie helped Martha pack her bags the next day and saw her off the next morning.Sitting tensely in the carriage, she looked very small.Because to go to Upper Fordring where Fairfax lives, you have to pass the hill where Howl's moving castle is entrenched.It is not difficult to understand why Martha was so horrified. "She'll be safe," Letty said.Letty didn't want help with packing.When the carriage had gone, Letty stuffed all her possessions into a pillowcase, and, paying sixpence, had the neighbor's footman wheelbarrow the goods to Cesarey's in Market Square.Letty followed the wheelbarrow leisurely, much happier than Sophie had expected.Her aura sweeps away the dust from a hat shop.

The valet brought back a hastily written note from Letty saying that she had settled in the girls' dormitory, and that Cesarey's shop looked interesting.A week later, the postman delivered Martha's mail.It said Martha had arrived safely, and that Mrs. Fairfax was "a most lovely person who uses honey for everything. She keeps bees".Such was the case with the two sisters that Sophie had known for a long time, for as soon as Martha and Letty left she began her own apprenticeship. Sophie had evidently become quite familiar with the hatter's business.As a small child, Sophie was bouncing in and out of the spacious workshop across the courtyard.Hats were heat-damp-set and air-dried on a hat tree; wax and satin were fashioned into flowers, fruit, and other accessories.She knows every worker.Most of them had been working in the shop since her father was a boy.She knew Bessie, the only clerk left.She knew the customers who came and went, and the man who drove the truck from the countryside to bring in the raw materials for straw hats; the straw hats that had just come in had to be shaped with molds in the workshop.She knew other suppliers and knew how to make winter felt hats.There was really nothing Fanny could teach her, except tout a customer to close a sale. "Honey, you've got to guide your customers to the right hat," said Fanny, "and show them the ones that don't quite fit first, so they'll know the difference when they put on the right one." The truth is, Sophie isn't very good at selling hats.First, I spent a day or so observing in the workshop, and then I followed Fanny to visit tailors and satin merchants.Fanny sent her to decorate hats.Sophie sat in the little room at the back of the shop, embroidering roses on bonnets, sewing veils on velvet caps, lining each with satin, and fitting fashionable waxed fruit and ribbons.She does it beautifully.She also enjoys it.But she felt extraordinarily lonely and a little uninterested.The people in the workshop were too old and not funny enough.Moreover, they always treated her with consideration of her status as heir to the hatter's shop.Bessie is no exception.Bessie's only subject was the farmer she was to marry the week after May.Sophie was quite jealous of Fanny, she could be busy at any time and go out to bargain with the silk merchants in a hurry. The most interesting thing is the small talk of the customers.Buying a hat will more or less gossip for a while.Sophie sat in her hut, embroidering and listening to gossip: the mayor never ate greens, Howl's moving castle went around the cliff again, someone really... Whisper, whisper, Whispers... people lowered their voices when Wizard Howl was mentioned, but Sophie figured he'd gone down to the valley to catch a girl last month. "Bluebeard!" people whispered, and then resumed their normal voices to the point that Jane Farrell's hair was so unappetizing.Even Wizard Howl wouldn't look at that hairstyle, let alone a gentleman.Then there were trembling whispers, mentioning the Wasteland Witch in a superficial way.Sophie began to think that Wizard Howl and the Witch of the Waste should really be a couple. "They were made in heaven. Someone should pull the thread." She muttered to the hat she was embroidering. But by the end of the month, the gossip in the store was all about Letty.It sounds like Cesare's shop is full of people from morning to night, and most of them are gentlemen. Everyone will buy a bunch of cakes, and Letty is designated to receive them.She has already had ten proposals, from street sweepers to the mayor's son.And she turned them all down, saying she was too young to make up her mind. "I think it's a wise move on her part," Sophie said to the bonnet, plaiting the satin. Fanny was glad to hear the news. "I knew she was going to be fine!" she said happily.From Sophie's point of view, Fanny was glad Letty wasn't around. "It's not good for Letty to stay in the shop," she told the bonnet, which kept pleating mushroom-coloured silk satin, "even if you had it on her head, you tacky old thing. The girls basically despaired of seeing Letty." As the days passed, Sophie and the hat talked more and more.There is no one else to talk to.Fanny was always out on business, or inciting customers with honeyed words, while Bessie was busy with receptions, telling everyone about her wedding plans.It was Sophie's habit to place each finished hat on a trellis, looking like a head without a body; she would pause to tell the hat what its matching body should look like.She would give a little compliment to the hat, because compliments are always meant to be. "You have a mysterious charm," she said of a veiled hat with hidden sequins."You're going to be super rich!" she said of a creamy white sombrero hat with roses embroidered on the brim, and another green caterpillar hat with curly green feathers, she said, "You look like a newcomer to spring." Young as a leaf.” She told the pink floppy hats, which exuded dimpled charm, and the chic hats trimmed with velvet, which were quick-witted.“You have a heart of gold, and one day someone will fall in love with you,” she told the bonnet with its mushroom-colored pleats, out of sympathy for the hat.It looks so dated, there's nothing compelling about it. The next day, Jane Farrell came to the store and bought the hat.Her hair was indeed a little weird, as if it had been burned with a row of pokers, Sophie thought, glancing out of her cabin.Poor enough, she picked the bonnet.But then it seemed like everyone was buying hats.Perhaps it was Fanny's successful promotion, or perhaps it was the beginning of spring, but business in the hat shop was on the rise.Fanny began to feel guilty. "I shouldn't have sent Martha and Letty away so soon. We can get on with it this way." April is coming to an end, May Day is coming, and customers are in an endless stream.Sophie also had to put on a neat gray dress and help in the shop.But in this way, it is difficult for her to do manual work while receiving customers.Every evening she took the hat to the next room and worked late into the night by the lamp, so that she would have hats to sell the next day.The green caterpillar hats like the Mayor's Wife are in short supply, as are the pink floppy hats.A week before May Day, a man came into the shop and asked for a bonnet with mushroom-coloured pleats, like the one Jane Farrell wore when she eloped with Lord Ketterlake. Sophie was working that night and deeply felt that her life was very boring.Instead of talking to the hats, she tried them on herself in the mirror after finishing one.This is not right.The dull gray dress did not suit Sophie, especially now that her eyes were red from her sewing.And caterpillar green or pink doesn't go well with her reddish wheat-colored hair.The one with the mushroom pleats just made her look lifeless. "Like an old woman!" said Sophie.She had no desire to elope with an Earl, like Jane Farrell, nor a half-town suitor, like Letty.But she wanted to do something—she wasn't sure what—something a little more fun than making hats.She thought about taking some time to talk to Letty the next day. But she didn't go.Not only was there no time, no courage, but the journey to the Market Square seemed too far away, or it would be dangerous for her to be alone, meet Wizard Howl or something—in short, the idea of ​​seeing her sister changed. become increasingly difficult to achieve.This is very strange.Sophie had always felt that she was about as strong-willed as Letty.Now she finds that there are some things she can't do until she has no excuses. "That's ridiculous!" said Sophie. "The Market Square is only two blocks away. If I run—" She made up her mind that she must go to Cesarey's when the May Hatters closed. At the same time, a new gossip came from the store.The king is said to have quarreled with his younger brother, Prince Justin, after which the prince was exiled.No one knows the exact reason for the quarrel, but just a few months ago, the prince in disguise did pass through Qiping Township without anyone knowing.The earl of Kettlec was sent by the king to search for the prince, but unexpectedly met Jane Farrell.Sophie listened, a little frustrated.Funny things do happen, but always with other people.But it's always good to go and see Letty. May Day is here.The carnival in the streets begins at dawn.Fanny was out early, but Sophie had a few hats to finish first.Sophie sang while she worked.Letty was at work, after all.Cesare's Cake Shop stays open until midnight during the festival. "I'm going to buy their brioche," Sophie decided. "I haven't eaten it in hundreds of years." She was excited as she watched the brightly dressed people, souvenir sellers, and people on stilts rushing past the window. But when Sophie finally walked down the street wearing a gray shawl over her gray dress, she couldn't be more excited.She was a little overwhelmed.There were so many people laughing and shouting, crowding around, it was too noisy and chaotic.Sophie felt that the past few months of quiet sewing had turned her into half an old woman, half sick, as it were.Wrapping her shawl tightly, she walked slowly close to the house, trying to avoid being stepped on her feet or hurt by elbows in the flowing silk sleeves.Sophie thought she was going to faint when there was a sudden boom somewhere in the air.She could see Wizard Howl's castle on the hillside beyond town, so close it seemed to be sitting on a chimney.Blue flames shot out from the four towers of the castle, turned into blue fireballs, and exploded high in the sky, which was scary.Wizard Howl seemed disturbed by May Day.Or it could be that he wants to join in the celebration, in his own way.Sophie was frightened and couldn't care less about it.Sophie would rather go home if she hadn't gone half way to Cesare.She ran. "How did I get the idea to make life interesting?" she asked herself as she ran. "I'd be scared to death. It's all because I'm the boss." When she got to the market square, it could only be said that things were much worse.Most of the taverns are concentrated near the square.Crowds of young men, reeking of booze, wandered crookedly to and fro, wearing flowing capes and long sleeves and buckle boots that a workday could not have dreamed of, talking loudly and flirting with girls with impunity.The girls hung out in groups, anticipating a conversation.It was all too commonplace for May Day, but Sophie was still spooked.Sophie retreated into the doorway of a shop and tried to hide when a young man in a respectable silver and blue suit aimed at Sophie and tried to accost her. The boy looked at her in surprise. "Well, you little squirrel," he said, laughing pitifully, "I just wanted to buy you a drink. Don't be so frightened." His pitying look really embarrassed Sophie.He was such a fresh young fellow, with a sharp, fine-featured face--well past twenty, well-groomed hair.His sleeves were longer and more flowing than anyone else's in the square, all rolled with ruffles and silver trim. "Oh, no, thank you, sir," Sophie stammered, "I, I'm going to see my sister." "Of course," said the big guy with a smile. "How can I prevent a beautiful lady from seeing her sister? You are so scared, do you want me to accompany you?" He spoke so kindly that Sophie was ashamed. "No. No, sir!" She fled, panting.He also uses perfume.The scent of hyacinths followed her.What an elegant person!Sophie was thinking, while pushing away the small table in the way of the entrance of Cesare's Cake Shop. The tables are crowded together.The store is bustling with activity, just like the square.Sophie found Letty among a row of clerks at the counter, for a group of what appeared to be farmers' sons was leaning against the counter, talking loudly to her.Letty was more beautiful than ever and seemed to be slimmer.She put the cake into the bag as fast as she could, and twisted the mouth of the bag skillfully.Every time he twisted a bag, he looked back at the other party with a smile and agreed.The shop was full of laughter.Sophie had to fight her way to the counter. Letty saw her.For a moment she trembled.Then she widened her eyes and cried out with laughter, "Sophie!" "Can I have a word with you?" Sophie yelled, "anywhere," she yelled a little helplessly as a bunch of well-dressed elbows pushed her away from the counter. "Wait a minute!" Letty snapped.She whispered something to the girl next to her.The girl nodded, grinning, and took Letty's place. "It's me," she said to the crowd, "next?" "But we want to talk to you, Letty!" cried a farmer's son. "Tell Kelly," Letty said, "I'm going to talk to my sister." Nobody listened.They pushed Sophie all the way to the end of the counter, where Letty was raising the lid to summon Sophie.They begged Sophie not to talk to Letty all day.Sophie managed to squeeze her way through the cover, and Letty took her by the wrist and pulled her to the back of the shop, into a room of stacked shelves, each shelf laden with neatly arranged cakes.Letty pulled out two stools. "Sit down." She signaled, looked casually at the shelf next to her, and handed a piece of cream cake to Sophie. "You're hungry," she said. Sophie slumped on the stool, smelling the rich aroma of the cake, with tears in her eyes. "Letty!" she said, "it's good to see you!" "Yeah, it's good to see you sit down," Letty said. "Listen, I'm not Letty, I'm Martha."